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THE attempt by Government to have the July 25 sitting of the National Assembly deferred to August 7 was done in good faith and was not without precedent, as similar adjournments were had in 2007, 2008, 2012, and more recently during a sitting in this year, Government’s Chief Whip Gail Teixeira said.“We did what has been done in parliament and was never challenged in the 8th, 9th and 10th parliament, as of May this year,” she told the Government Information Agency during the recess of yesterday’s sitting of the National Assembly.
“The intentions were good, we believe that there’s hope and opportunity, and we felt that by doing this we were creating an opportunity to have agreement, but the motion was defeated,” she said.
Despite stirring pleas by the government side of the House, the motion was outvoted, by the Opposition’s 32 against the government’s 27 votes.
Teixeira noted, “Politics isn’t about this behaviour that we are seeing in this parliament, it is about genuine leaders sitting down and trying to find genuine solutions, where both sides can come away with having something and not necessarily having everything”.
Leader of the House, Prime Minister Samuel Hind, who moved the motion in the National Assembly seeking an adjournment of yesterday’s Parliamentary sitting said the decision was taken, “to allow for the last opportunity in this session before the recess for further consultations at the highest levels with the objective of restoring these items and ensuring their safe passage through the National Assembly”.
The Prime Minister had Wednesday made his plea via a letter which was copied to Opposition Leader David Granger, Clerk of the National Assembly Sherlock Isaacs, Government’s Chief Whip Gail Teixeira and Opposition Chief Whip, Amna Ally.
The Prime Minister informed the Speaker that the adjournment of the sitting would provide more time for the parliamentary parties to reach consensus on what government viewed as, “this most significant and single largest transformative development project”. He was referring to the Amaila Falls Hydro project, whose bill and motion were voted down by the opposition at the July 18 sitting.
This move to defer the sitting was criticised by Opposition members such as APNU’s Basil Williams, Joe Harmon and the AFC’s Moses Nagamootoo who objected to the wording of the letter which they said declared that the sitting would be adjourned instead of being a request.
The House had late Wednesday afternoon announced that the sitting would have been postponed, but the House Speaker later advised the two Chief Whips and Leader of the Alliance For Change, Khemraj Ramjattan that the sitting would be convened even if it meant that the scheduled business could not go ahead.
Meanwhile, with regards to the parliamentary Opposition’s claim that government wants to defer local government elections, Teixeira said that this was simply not true. “We have said it publicly, that we want local government elections. These four bills are not required for local government elections, but they are required for post-local government elections. We have an act right now that allows us to have local government elections under the new hybrid system. The Opposition has held out all the time that unless these bills for post elections are resolved, then they don’t have local government elections, and that has been their position for the last seven eight years”
The Chief Whip said that government has indicated its willingness to debate the said bills, “Even when we were last week trying to get them to agree to Amaila, we said that we are prepared to bring the four bills, we will say what we have objections to, we are prepared to let the bills go through”.
Teixeira said that the problem with the Parliamentary Opposition is that Amaila is a national project, a transformative project, and it will be the single largest developmental project in Guyana since independence. “The impact for this will go on for decades, it’s not just for this generation… in terms of not only electricity for ordinary people and the price coming down, it is also attractive for investors who need to have access to cheap and reliable electricity. Certain developments have been held off because we haven’t got a reliable supply at a good price.”
The two sticking points, the need for Local Government elections and for the Amaila Hydro Project are viewed as very important by government, but Teixeira opined that they are not exactly related, as “one is an issue of patriotism and moving forward on a programme that is for the benefit for our nation and where it needs people to buy into that, and to be able to support it, whether they like the government of the day or not. The government is anxious to have Local Government elections as we can have them tomorrow, with or without these bills. The issue is that the opposition doesn’t want it that way. All this talk about local government elections is rather fallacious because they know that the act that allows for local government elections under the new hybrid system was passed in 2009 in this House. They have refused to have local government elections unless these four bills are passed”.
The Chief Whip reiterated that government is not blocking any election and the public needs to understand this fact clearly. “Local government elections can be held at any time, based on the law we now have. The issue is based on a political impasse…we are prepared to go ahead with local government elections and we’re prepared to debate it before recess. They may not like what we have to say, but in a parliamentary committee the majority exercises its vote despite efforts by the government’s side to say let’s compromise on this, they say ‘No, no, vote, vote’. This is the attitude so what are we supposed to do when we come to parliament? We don’t have the right to speak? Is the right for democracy only for the Opposition side because they have one seat more than us?”
“The intentions were good, we believe that there’s hope and opportunity, and we felt that by doing this we were creating an opportunity to have agreement, but the motion was defeated,” she said.
Despite stirring pleas by the government side of the House, the motion was outvoted, by the Opposition’s 32 against the government’s 27 votes.
Teixeira noted, “Politics isn’t about this behaviour that we are seeing in this parliament, it is about genuine leaders sitting down and trying to find genuine solutions, where both sides can come away with having something and not necessarily having everything”.
Leader of the House, Prime Minister Samuel Hind, who moved the motion in the National Assembly seeking an adjournment of yesterday’s Parliamentary sitting said the decision was taken, “to allow for the last opportunity in this session before the recess for further consultations at the highest levels with the objective of restoring these items and ensuring their safe passage through the National Assembly”.
The Prime Minister had Wednesday made his plea via a letter which was copied to Opposition Leader David Granger, Clerk of the National Assembly Sherlock Isaacs, Government’s Chief Whip Gail Teixeira and Opposition Chief Whip, Amna Ally.
The Prime Minister informed the Speaker that the adjournment of the sitting would provide more time for the parliamentary parties to reach consensus on what government viewed as, “this most significant and single largest transformative development project”. He was referring to the Amaila Falls Hydro project, whose bill and motion were voted down by the opposition at the July 18 sitting.
This move to defer the sitting was criticised by Opposition members such as APNU’s Basil Williams, Joe Harmon and the AFC’s Moses Nagamootoo who objected to the wording of the letter which they said declared that the sitting would be adjourned instead of being a request.
The House had late Wednesday afternoon announced that the sitting would have been postponed, but the House Speaker later advised the two Chief Whips and Leader of the Alliance For Change, Khemraj Ramjattan that the sitting would be convened even if it meant that the scheduled business could not go ahead.
Meanwhile, with regards to the parliamentary Opposition’s claim that government wants to defer local government elections, Teixeira said that this was simply not true. “We have said it publicly, that we want local government elections. These four bills are not required for local government elections, but they are required for post-local government elections. We have an act right now that allows us to have local government elections under the new hybrid system. The Opposition has held out all the time that unless these bills for post elections are resolved, then they don’t have local government elections, and that has been their position for the last seven eight years”
The Chief Whip said that government has indicated its willingness to debate the said bills, “Even when we were last week trying to get them to agree to Amaila, we said that we are prepared to bring the four bills, we will say what we have objections to, we are prepared to let the bills go through”.
Teixeira said that the problem with the Parliamentary Opposition is that Amaila is a national project, a transformative project, and it will be the single largest developmental project in Guyana since independence. “The impact for this will go on for decades, it’s not just for this generation… in terms of not only electricity for ordinary people and the price coming down, it is also attractive for investors who need to have access to cheap and reliable electricity. Certain developments have been held off because we haven’t got a reliable supply at a good price.”
The two sticking points, the need for Local Government elections and for the Amaila Hydro Project are viewed as very important by government, but Teixeira opined that they are not exactly related, as “one is an issue of patriotism and moving forward on a programme that is for the benefit for our nation and where it needs people to buy into that, and to be able to support it, whether they like the government of the day or not. The government is anxious to have Local Government elections as we can have them tomorrow, with or without these bills. The issue is that the opposition doesn’t want it that way. All this talk about local government elections is rather fallacious because they know that the act that allows for local government elections under the new hybrid system was passed in 2009 in this House. They have refused to have local government elections unless these four bills are passed”.
The Chief Whip reiterated that government is not blocking any election and the public needs to understand this fact clearly. “Local government elections can be held at any time, based on the law we now have. The issue is based on a political impasse…we are prepared to go ahead with local government elections and we’re prepared to debate it before recess. They may not like what we have to say, but in a parliamentary committee the majority exercises its vote despite efforts by the government’s side to say let’s compromise on this, they say ‘No, no, vote, vote’. This is the attitude so what are we supposed to do when we come to parliament? We don’t have the right to speak? Is the right for democracy only for the Opposition side because they have one seat more than us?”
